“When this you see, remember me” — an autograph book from nineteenth-century Texas

Tucked away in an envelope, in a box, on a shelf in the basement of Carroll Library is a tiny book embossed with a picture of a rabbit.  Smaller than a smart phone, this wonderful little object is an autograph book that once belonged to Ida Ainsworth of Liberty Hill, Texas.  It’s dated 1888 (though a few pages seem to be from 1887), and is signed by her friends and family, and by her teacher.

If you’ve never seen one, an autograph book is meant to be a keepsake.  They were customarily filled with rhymes and memorable sayings, each signer choosing a page and trying to come up with a poem that no one else had used.  Autograph books’ popularity has declined in recent years, but you can still purchase one for graduation or your next trip to a Disney theme park, and there is even a book of autograph rhymes if you haven’t had a chance to memorize anything beyond “Roses are red, violets are blue….”

Though autograph books may still be found, with a few exceptions, the messages in Ida’s book are strikingly different from those a modern student would write.  They are often touching and sober, recalling the passage of time, the parting of friends, and the inevitability of death.   They reminded me a bit of memento mori, and I thought of all of Ida’s friends who have long since passed. 

Yet, even as it brings to mind the dead, this little book also stands against time’s stream, as each page becomes not only a memento mori but also a memento mei—“Remember me!” Dear Ida,  Dear Reader,  remember my youth, my laughter, our friendship.  Remember me as I was in this moment.

Dust to dust…the saying applies to people and to books.  Those of us who work in libraries and archives are in the memory business.  Though we do not know who Ida was, or anything of her friends and family, we preserve the memento they have left behind, and hold it for the researcher who may someday come to recreate the story of these lives, and others, that make up the story of Texas.

My Friend Ida A. When this you see remember me.  Henry T.  Jan 2 [?] 88

July 5th 1888  Dear Ida. Speak of me kindly When life drems are ore.  Speak of me gently when I am no more  Tinae Gillaspy

Dear Ida A line is enough to Ask rememberance  Your Schoolmate  Emm H.  Liberty Hill Nov. 28 1888

Dear Ida, Poor ink  Poor pen  poor writer  Amen.   Your Nephew Walter Lasseberger  

Dear Ida- Think often and always kindly of your true friend.  Francis

Dear Ida Remember a beautiful life ends not in death.

Little Friend:  In the golden chain of friendship regard me as a link.  Your friend Hollie Cates  Liberty Hill Jan 21 1888

Dear Ida.   Will you sometimes think Of me with kindness and Love. Liberty Hill, Jan. 19 1888  Your friend  Nora Gillaspy

Dear Ida.  Love many trust Few and Always paddle your own canoe.  Is the wish of your friend Elie

To Ida  If you wish that happiness  Your coming day and years may bless  And virtues crown your brow;  Remain as as you are wont to be  Faultless as you’ve been knon to me  Remain as pure as you are now.   Is the wish of—   Sister Mattie

My little student.  Always remember with true affection.  Your teacher Jean S. Fry. –19, ‘87

To Ida  Love me little  Love me long  Do not flirt for that is wrong.

Dear Ida  When you get old and canot see put on your specks and think of me  Your friend and Schoolmate Marine

Dear Little Ida,  Who does the best his circumstance allows, Does well;  Acts nobly; Angels could do no more.  Lovingly,  Mother  Liberty Hill  Feb 10th 88

Texas Trailers


The Texas Collection staff decided to have a bit of fun over the summer and created video trailers to introduce you to some of our favorite collections.  Our Texas Trailers are up on YouTube for your viewing pleasure.  We’ve put together short movies about western pulp fiction, panoramic photographs, promotional literature, the Adams-Blakley collection, and Jules Bledsoe archival materials. We hope you’ll enjoy this look into the stacks and vaults here at Carroll Library.  Leave your comments below!

Dear Lera…

smoke girl

Dear Lera—How are you these hot days? Electric light man is here and will study by new lights tonight. Everything is in a tumble. Every one is well. Baby has three teeth now. How do you like this card?  Miss H. didn’t say a word it was me will tell you later. May go to Dallas tomorrow after a hat. Will write soon. Perle B.

Like the artist’s sketch dashed off to capture a moment, a few words and a picture on a postcard can open a much larger world to the imagination.  Mailed in 1911 to Miss Lera Brown at Baylor, this postcard shows a young man envisioning a beautiful woman in his cigarette smoke.  Along with her face and hair there is a ring—perhaps an engagement ring—signaling that he imagines his beloved, or a yet-unmet future wife.  The couple’s red lips and eyes mirror each other, and the shape and angle of the ring echo the man’s collar.  It’s a dreamy picture that creates a fantasy for the viewer, that of the dashing young man who longs for love and marriage.

The note on the back is also full of revealing details conveyed with great economy.  The card was mailed in October but it’s still hot in Texas!  And “everything is in a tumble” as the new electric lights are installed.  How delightful it will be to study tonight by the light of this relatively recent home improvement.

We read about the baby who is growing, and a possible trip to the big city to shop for a new hat. We sense that Perle B. found this postcard interesting or fitting, as she wonders, “How do you like this card?”  There is a hint of mystery and a need for discretion regarding a Miss H. (“will tell you later”), and like Lera, we can’t wait to hear all the details.

But by this time, there is no more space for writing, so the postcard ends with the promise we all hope to hear when we are away from home: “Will write soon.”   I like to imagine that Perle kept her promise and sent other cards and letters to Baylor that year, knowing, as John Donne did that  “more than kisses, letters mingle souls, for thus friends absent speak.”

smoke girl postcard back

Before the Decepticons: early projected images from the Victor Animatograph Company

In the days before Decepticons and Autobots, Viopticons, Stereopticons, and the other members of the Magic Lantern family thrilled audiences in darkened rooms. While perhaps difficult for us to imagine from our movie-savy perspective, for many years before the advent of cinema people went out to the “picture show” to look at slides.  Theatergoers were captivated by the magical effect of these projected images. Eventually, enterprising showmen added musicians and sound effects to enhance the show–even animating the images by various mechanical techniques. During the late 18th and 19th centuries, phantasmagoria shows left audiences shivering with terror for fear that ghosts and demons had been set upon them.

The Texas Collection recently uncovered two boxes of glass slides manufactured by the Victor Animatograph Co. of Davenport, Iowa. These slides were 2 x 2.25 inches and were shown on the Viopticon, the first truly portable stereopticon. The Vioptican projected images using a brilliant carbon arc lamp.  Sets of Viopticon slides were available for purchase or rent as illustrated lectures. Our two sets of slides were used by Baylor history professor Francis Gevrier Guittard in the early 1900s. One set contains hand-tinted photographs of Yellowstone National Park, and the other set depicts important events from the life of George Washington during the American Revolution. While these slides were not part of a spectacular Magic Lantern theater experience, they represent an early example of educational technology as manufacturers began to promote the use of projectors in the classroom.

The inventor of the Viopticon, Alexander Victor, lived a fascinating life. Born in Sweden in 1878, his first career was as a magician and showman working with the renowned Stephanio. Victor had obtained an early Lumiere Cinematograph and added projected pictures to Stephanio’s show, much to audience delight.  After Stephanio’s death, Victor continued touring with his own troupe, but a warehouse fire in Ohio destroyed his entire collection of magical props and his career as a performer ended.

Despite this setback, the astonishingly creative Victor began again, and went on to invent the first electric washing machine for the White Lily Company.   In keeping with his interest in projected images, and recognizing that there could be a larger market for motion pictures than as entertainment, Victor next invented what may be the first amateur 16mm movie camera and projector.  In 1915, realizing that the danger created from highly flammable nitrate film stock would limit market growth in schools, businesses, and churches, Victor began pushing the film industry to adopt new safety standards and move to cellulose acetate “safety film.”

You can see a slideshow of these Viopticon images and imagine yourself in an early 20th century classroom by visiting our flickr page. For the Yellowstone slides click here, and for George Washington, click here.

Trust but verify: looking at a fragment of Civil War history

At some point in our lives most of us pass through that phase where we believe “if you see it in print, it must be true.” In the world of Special Collections, this can also mean that when an object has a handwritten note identifying it, you accept the note as factual. Unfortunately, real life is rarely so reliable.

Take for example, a set of reprints we found of the Ulster County Gazette dated January 4, 1800 and reporting the death of George Washington. Accompanying several obvious reprints was a very nice copy on rag paper in a folder marked “Original.”  Was this in fact an incredibly valuable original? Had we discovered a long lost treasure hiding in the archives? Our hearts beat a little faster until we determined that, no, it was a reprint too. Someone creating that folder (in the days before internet access) had been mistaken.

But even with all the resources of scholarship at your fingertips, authentication remains a tricky business. Consider the framed bit of cloth pictured above and its two captions. The first, handwritten on the paper to which the cloth is attached, reads

Ft. Moultrie (S.C.)

Garrison Flag ““ size about 15 ft. by 18.

It flew while Heroic Sumter was bombarded April 12th – 13th 1861.

C.H.

The second note is on a separate sheet at the bottom and says:

Piece of bunting from the flag

that floated above Ft. Sumter

during its bombardment  April 12-13, 1861.

It was 15 ft. by 18 ft.

Sent to Hon. Geo. Clark in a letter.

R.E. Pare, Macon, GA

So where did the flag fly and whose flag was it? The original object indicates that this flag flew over Fort Moultrie–a position from which the Confederate Army fired on Fort Sumter.  The second caption says the flag came from Fort Sumter–which would mean it was a Federal flag. And, while it seems likely that this second note is an error made by a descendant or a later owner, if this is a Confederate artifact, what do the words “Heroic Sumter” mean?

If you have any thoughts you’d like to share with us on our latest puzzle, we hope you’ll leave us a comment below. By the way, there is a Texas connection to the Battle of Fort Sumter: a completely unauthorized surrender was arranged with the Union troops by Texan Louis T. Wigfall who rowed out to the fort in a skiff. Wigfall, a one-time U.S. Senator, went on to lead the Texas Brigade until his fondness for whiskey and hard cider made it necessary for him to resign his commission. He was replaced by John Bell Hood.

Questions for you from The Texas Collection

In the days of the fountain pen, before the invention of the ballpoint, blotting paper was an everyday essential and advertising blotters were as common as today’s business cards. Advertising blotters were small cards, usually with colorful pictures, printed with advertising on the front.  Nearly every company handed them out. The pictures might be related to the product being advertised, or they could be movie stars, pinup girls, calendars, or patriotic and historical images. To get a sense of how blotters fit into daily life, read “Tips from the Traveling Salesman” by Frank Farrington in which a frustrated man tears up a poor quality advertising blotter and gives the writer a lesson in best practices for blotter advertising [Grand Rapids Furniture Record , Vol. 36 (February, 1921), p.121].

The Texas Collection has in its archives, as part of the Frank Watt collection, a salesman’s sample book of advertising blotters. This book contains page after page of beautiful advertising artwork from what we think is the early 1900s.  Businesses could choose the blank blotters they wished to imprint with their advertising and place an order with the salesman.

We hope you’ll share with us what you know about advertising blotters. Can you help us date this sample book? Do you recognize any of the artists responsible for the images? Add your comments below!

–GPH


[slideshow]